different between jewish vs refusenik

English

Etymology

refuse +? -nik

Pronunciation

Noun

refusenik (plural refuseniks)

1. (Soviet Union, slang, historical) One of the Jewish citizens of the former Soviet Union who were refused permission to emigrate.
2. (colloquial) A person who refuses to do something, for example one who refuses conscription or vaccination.
   • 2006, Lawrence Thompson, The Princeton University Library Chronicle, page 678::

     Richard Ellmann once referred to Samuel Beckett as “Nayman from Noland”—the author as national refusenik. Beckett famously refused to allow a national representative from either Ireland or or France tot pick up his Nobel Prize […]

   • 2008, Sergio Catignani, Israeli Counter-Insurgency and the Intifadas: Dilemmas of a Conventional Army, Routledge (?ISBN), page 94:

     One IDF refusenik recounted how commanders on the field tried very hard to accommodate potential conscientious objectors by offering alternative and less controversial missions, in order to avoid their refusal to serve from becoming a public, and thus, political statement: […]

Synonyms

• (citizen refused permission to emigrate): otkaznik

Related terms

• recusant

See also

• (one who refuses to do something): anti-vaccinationist

References

• “refusenik”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–present.